One Last Time
by fairyMei33
Summary: Hisoka's thoughts as he dies in the hospital. Ending slightly changed due to popular demand.
1. One Last Time

Disclaimer: I own no part of Yami no Matsuei. This story is for entertainment only.

AN: Please go to the second chapter to see the Author's note. Advised to do so after reading the revised story as it explains some questions that have been asked.

ONE LAST TIME

I knew you were her the moment you stepped beyond the building's threshold. Even crowded among the sea of other thoughts I could pick you out. Like a shard of razor glass among dull diamonds. I've felt your hate for over a decade. I'm intimately familiar with the feel of its blade.

Even though, with every step, that blade became ever sharper and colder as you came closer, I wished that you would come to my room this time.

I know you only come to speak with my ever-confused doctors. You've always insisted on being well-informed about my deteriorating condition.

Maybe they will convince you to see me this time.

There is so little of me left now.

I feel like an empty shell.

It doesn't matter if you hate me. It doesn't matter that there is no shred of compassion or affection for me in your heart.

I just want to see you one last time.

I don't have long.

I don't know how I know. How does anyone know they know anything? I just know there isn't enough left of me to last until your next sporadic visit.

I want to see you walk through my door. I want to see your face.

Some part of me would even like you to hug me.

I don't care if you don't mean it.

I don't care how much your hate will hurt me.

I just want a hug like you used to give me so long ago. Before you couldn't stand to touch me.

Before you hated me.

Maybe I could pretend – just for a moment – that you still loved me.

Just as I could feel when you entered the building, I could also feel when you left it.

The last of my strength went with you.

Hope, after all, is a fire, and it consumed that last little bit of me that was left.

Maybe… maybe it's better this way.

Yes. It must be better.

I close my eyes.

Take a shuddering breath which causes all my ribs to hurt.

Let it out slowly.

… one… last… time…

……

…. mother…


	2. Author's Note

Disclaimer: I own no part of Yami no Matsuei. This story is for entertainment only.

Everyone seemed to dislike the last line, so I took it off. I agree that it doesn't flow with the rest of the story, but I felt that I should end the final proof that he dies at the end of this story, even if it is rather obvious.

After the reviews I was rather torn between either removing the last line or changing it as Guardian-381 suggested, so that the last line would be a barb against his mother's 'loving maternal care of her sick son.' In the end I simply took it off, although I did like Guardian-381's point.

I would like it noted that when I originally wrote this, I kept it parentally ambiguous, though I had meant it to be to his father. When I typed it out, I put 'her' instead of 'here' and it added a new depth to the meaning of the story that I had not intended but now am ecstatic over.

All the 'Hisoka dying' fics that I've read put Nagare into the neglectful parent part and seem to forget about the mother completely. I suppose it's because when the mother is more firmly introduced, she's dying herself and his father is being an unfeeling bast—err bad guy. You immediately get a little sympathy for the mother. But it seems we all forgot that it was _both_ of them that neglected and mentally abused Hisoka, and then they _both _left him alone to die in the hospital. Even though Nagare is the head of house, his mother could have still gone to see Hisoka, either in his cell or in the hospital, if she had only said it was to 'keep up appearances'. After all, the villagers' revere them as saviors, but with their only son so ill, a few visits would have only heightened the villagers' opinion of them and certainly not hurt anything. Even if he was a failure as an heir and would obviously die before Nagare could pass on the family 'curse'.

They both _consciously chose _to abandon him.

I think that Hisoka's mother's betrayal was worse than his father's because all children cling more to their mother's love than their father's. It doesn't matter how old you get, you always remember your mother for her love and attention more than your father.

Why else do you think everyone always does a 'Hi Mom!' when they're on TV and no a 'Hi Dad!'?

So I think, that when Hisoka was slowly dying in the hospital, he probably yearned more for his mother than his father, and for her to reject him like that while he was dying, probably did a lot of emotional damage.

That's also why I added the new last line.

Even through all the betrayal, at the end, he still clings to the memories of his mother before she hated him.

I think that makes it poignant and sad.

P.S. The reason I did so many single line sentences was to show the deterioration in Hisoka's speed of thought. I know that it's a little confusing, but he's dying and extremely weak so he's thinking in singular thought forms rather than consecutive thought paragraphs. He isn't analyzing things in full detail, but stating things in the simplest of terms in the ways he sees and thinks about them.


End file.
